Hitting the Bottom
by MeredithBrody
Summary: Brody doesn't know how to deal with the Moultrie and Emily's death, leading her down a dark path. (A "What If" AU)(Warnings for drug addiction and suicidality)
1. Alibis

**So, this fic has been up on AO3 for a while, but I decided to bring it over here in honour of my 50th NCIS: New Orleans fic (that happened damn fast. Took me a year to write that much ENT). This is _not_ a fic for a happy ending. So far it's only a twoshot, but there is an option to continue it. It's another Brody/Gibbs story, but the relationship is only really implied in this one. This covers drug addiction and suicidality. So read with caution.  
Shin xx**

* * *

 _ **From the scrapes and bruises, to the familiar abuses  
I'll kick and scream but that never changes anything  
And I could spill my guts out, wearing my best little girl pout  
And I almost missed it, but nobody said that this was gonna be easy**_

Was there really any point in continuing this charade. For Meredith Brody the last year had shown her that she really wasn't worth anything. She was a fairly decent agent, but only if she wasn't left on her own. She was the reason five sailors were dead, and they had all had so much to offer.

She didn't know what to do without Emily. That was how this had all started. Emily had died and she had shut down. Then after the incident on the _Moultrie_ she'd started drinking. Anything that could have helped her cope, help her forget the look on Hooper's face as she'd shouted at him to stop. She still remembered the image of him and the others after the bomb had gone. Hooper was dead straight away, so were two of the officers. The others... she remembered everything about that day. That's what she was trying to forget.

No matter what she did, she couldn't push it out of her mind. She'd begun drinking more, and more, until one day someone had offered her something to make her forget for a few hours. It had worked that first time, then she'd just kept trying for more. That was how she'd made it to this point. She barely knew these guys, and they shared nothing in common other than the need to get high.

Maybe she'd been worth saving once, maybe she'd had a life that was going to go somewhere and change something. She'd long since been nothing but a waste of space. She was still trying to disguise her problems, to pretend that she wasn't in as much trouble as she was, but it wasn't working at all. At this point she was pretty sure that everybody knew.

She had tried to give up, to put the drugs behind her and stop using them, but it hadn't lasted. As soon as the nightmares started, the dreams where Emily, not Hooper, blew the IED, she was done. She couldn't let go, and she couldn't deal with seeing that over and over again in her mind.

 _ **Most times it all comes out wrong, I don't know the words but I'll hum along  
There's nothing familiar here anymore to anyone or anything left to feel alive  
And I still taste that sickness and it makes me crazy without it at best  
But I'm in the same place I used to be, but I'm trying harder not to be**_

After almost a year she was at breaking point. One year ago today her twin sister had been ripped away from her, and that had been the beginning of the end. She had known at that moment that she was never going to get over it. She knew what she'd needed to say back then, and what she still needed to say, but it was far too hard. How was she supposed to ask for help when all the words came out jumbled up and confused, and nobody truly cared enough anyway.

There was nobody familiar left, nobody who knew her and cared about her. They had all long since left her, and she had nothing that was keeping her grounded. If nobody cared about her, nobody would miss her anyway. She didn't feel like she was really alive anymore. She was just floating through life, and not doing it very well. Every time she stopped to think, she realised how long it had been, and she'd end up pulling more toward her, and scoring another hit.

No matter what she did she could taste the drugs in her mouth. She could feel them pumping around her veins. She knew that sweet relief and oblivion was coming. Brody was getting more and more desperate when it came to trying to score. She just wasn't sure she could live without it now. She could taste it, smell it, no matter what she was doing. Without it she was going crazy, and there was absolutely nothing that could stop her from feeling terrible. She wished she'd never started this, but now she couldn't stop.

She had fallen into this place. She wasn't like those other people whenever she tried to go to rehab. She had started using because of a trauma. Because of PTSD. She didn't know if that was a reason or an excuse now. All she knew was that she had so much that she regretted, but she didn't see any reason to change. Sometimes she imagined what Emily would say, but that would inevitably lead to her wanting to see her sister again. The only way that would happen would be if she gave up on all of this.

Trying to get out was just not as easy as she'd though, and every time she got a foot on the ladder she fell back again, and she wasn't strong enough to keep going when nobody was going to care either way. She just wasn't a priority to anybody, least of all herself.

 _ **This is not the man I hoped to be  
And I'm just trying to stop the bleeding  
I don't know how the words go  
I just started not to say no**_

Saying no seemed like something there was no longer any point in her doing. Whether she said no or not, the people that she had found herself associating with were going to try and take what they wanted from her eventually. Giving up seemed so much earlier. After the last year she didn't deserve to walk away alive anyway. She wasn't who she thought she was, and she couldn't stop the feeling that any good in her was seeping out of her through some invisible wound.

She felt the four men in the room move closer to her, and she was already certain that this was going to end one of two ways. She didn't know what was going on in the rest of this house, but she knew this room. After a few seconds of them moving she sensed someone else coming into the room, and somehow she knew this one, the smell was all she needed to know for certain that she knew had walked in. Why was he here though, when she wasn't worth saving. "Boys, you might want to step away from her."

"Who the hell are you." She heard one of them answer, and she wasn't entirely certain what happened next, other than the men who had been crowding around her since she'd pulled the needle out of her bag had backed away. She was too out of it to really know more than that, but she was free another day, and that was a big thing. As soon as he spoke, she knew for a fact who had arrived, and what he'd done. Some part of her mind was still working well enough to know that.

"Federal Agent. I suggest you move along." There was a coldness in those words that froze the room, but a moment later he dropped down next to her. She sensed him looking at her and closed her eyes ashamed. She knew what he saw, what they all saw, but she just hadn't been strong enough to stop alone. "Meredith, what have you got yourself into?" He asked softly, and she didn't know how to answer that.

"Gibbs?" She asked cloudily, putting her hand on his cheek. She hadn't seen him in a long time, and the last time he had seen her she'd been so much more worth his friendship. She'd had everything to live for. No longer. James was gone, Emily too. She was responsible for five deaths, and she just wanted it all to stop. "Just leave me to die."

"I can't do that, come on." He picked her up, and she just closed her eyes and hoped that he was too late. He took the needle from her arm and pulled her along with him, never letting go of her for a second. Really, there was no good reason for keeping her alive, so she didn't know why he'd saved her.


	2. Skin and Bones

**Alright so, information. Both these chapters were inspired by Marianas Trench songs. The last chapter was "Alibis" and this chapter is "Skin and Bones". Both those songs are about recovering from drug addiction, and they are the main reason I wrote this. For now, this one is complete, but there is a probability that I'll add to it, when I've reduced my WIP list considerably.  
Shin xx**

* * *

 _ **I lock the door  
Turn all the water on  
And bury that sound  
So no one hears anything anymore  
Mirror lie to me, tell me you can see  
Maybe you won't be able to recognize me now**_

The door was the only thing that separated her right now from facing all the judgement that she probably deserved. She remembered everything that had happened the night before, and now that she was coming down she knew that the shame was coming. She still didn't know how he'd found her, but she also just didn't care. She'd tried to sleep, she'd tried to stop wishing that she'd died in that heroin house, away from everyone else.

She stood and turned the taps of the bath on slowly, so they made as much sound as possible. That was when she stripped off and looked at her arms and legs. She was covered in track marks, and she realised how bad she'd gotten recently. She then looked at her skin, paper thin and brittle. She could see almost all her ribs. There was nothing healthy about this.

All she wanted to do was scream about the hopelessness of this situation. She looked in the mirror and was momentarily convinced it was lying to her. She looked gaunt, with dead eyes and hollowed cheeks. She didn't look like the person she remembered. She hoped that Jethro couldn't hear her wails of anguish as she began to face the depth to which she'd sunk. There were a lot of things that she could cope with, but she was pretty certain that that would push her over the edge in another direction.

Hiding and burying the sounds she was making along with the emotions she was feeling she climbed into the bath and tried to clean herself off. She wanted to think about something else, but as she cleaned over herself she discovered new things about her body. Things she probably shouldn't know. Why had she ever started this. Why had she ever though that this was a good way to cope.

She caught sight of herself in the mirror again as she stood up, and she barely recognised herself. If she didn't know this was her, she would have been questioning the magic mirror. How anyone had known it was her was far beyond her. Was she this sick looking to everyone.

 _ **It only hurt a bit  
I still feel like shit  
And I think you won't be able to recognize me now  
It's easier to quit  
It's harder to admit  
And you're pushing me, you're fucking pushing me!**_

She already had the shakes. Recently that had been the sign that she'd needed to score, but she knew that she wasn't going to be allowed to score. The fact that she had the shakes would mean that the pain and the paranoia and everything else would be coming in the next few hours. She decided that coming out of the bathroom was probably the better idea, before Jethro broke the door down to check on her. He was being a good friend, and she was happy about that.

"How did you find me?" She asked as she walked back into the bedroom and tried to sound like she actually cared. She didn't, it was something of passing interest, that might intrigue her or interest her as time went on. He seemed to have noticed that she wasn't quite herself still, either that or he was just always this watchful of people who he saved.

"There was an undercover agent in the house who worked with us in Manchester." That was five years earlier. How did anyone remember her after that long, how did anyone recognise her now. That was so strange for her, and she didn't really know what to think, or what to believe. Jethro didn't care, he just continued speaking. "He called me rather than the authorities."

"How did either of you even recognise me?" That was still the most strange thing in this whole story. How anyone recognised her, and why anyone would care to find her. She had never thought she was that person. The one that people would chase down because they were worried about her.

"Meredith. You and I share something, I could recognise you anywhere." She let that sink in for a moment, and wondered if that was true. She knew that something had connected them on that case, but she hadn't realised it had been so serious, for either of them. Now though, she had to admit he was right. That gave her something to focus on. "We're going to a doctor." He muttered after a little while, but she wasn't doing that.

"No we're not." She was forceful, and she was willing to fight him on that point. He might think that would help her quit, but it wouldn't. The quitting part of this was the easiest part, the acceptance, the recovery... that was always much easier. That required more than she was able to give. "Quitting is easy. Admitting I had a problem is hard."

"You do have a problem." He said simply. It was easy for him to see it that way. She did have a problem, but not the one he thought. Her problem was her inability to cope. Her inability to see anything good, anything as being worthy of keeping her alive, of keeping her moving. The addiction stemmed from that, and if she managed to get through that she'd start finding things earlier. She knew that going cold-turkey was the best thing for her.

"No." She still wasn't going to admit it. The fact that he'd seen her at her worst didn't matter. It was a one-off. That's all he needed to know. He didn't need to know that there were nights she couldn't remember, normally in more trustworthy establishments, and he didn't need to know that she had been doing this for almost the entire year since the _Moultrie_ investigation ended.

She wasn't ready to be pushed into treatment. Would she need it eventually? Almost certainly, but she still wasn't ready to be pushed into it. Jethro wouldn't stop though, she knew him better than that. If he'd decided that she was going to be his reclamation project, then he wouldn't stop until she was sober. That was going to take time, and she knew from experience that withdrawal was going to be awful. She needed to choose for herself.

 _ **Laughin' like it works  
Bleeding like it don't hurt  
Knock you off your feet  
Even if you need me  
Tear you apart and I hate how I need you**_

He didn't push to make her see someone, and he didn't push to make her leave. He just left her in that room until she needed him. She'd sworn to herself that she wasn't going to do anything whether she needed someone or not, but the early hours of the withdrawal weren't agreeing with the determination. She needed something. She didn't know what, but she needed something. She was shaky, lethargic and feeling sick to her stomach. One or the other symptom made her cry out for him, and he ran back into the room and took hold of her again. "I got you."

"I don't want to need you Jethro." She sobbed into his chest as he wrapped her up, and she remembered how it felt to be held and protected. She was still wanting to push him away, because she really didn't want to go through this. Yet at the same time, facing it alone felt even scarier. She wasn't sure she could do that this time.

"I know." He didn't sound insulted at that, or upset. He just accepted that. She didn't want to need anyone, but at least she was accepting his help. She had debated that, but he genuinely wanted to help her, and while he would eventually push, right now he was letting her do thing the way she needed to do them.

"Why did this all have to happen to me?" She cried into his arms, her hopelessness and anguish over everything in her life returning. Merri knew she needed to face all of this, but she didn't want to. Right now she just thought that floating away to some imaginary land would be so much easier. "I just want to die." The pain, the shakes, all of it. It was too much for someone who didn't deserve to be alive anyway. She should give up now and just let this sickness win.

"I don't know. But you're getting through." He placed gentle, light kisses in her hair, and she knew that he was trying to pass some of his strength and belief over to her. She still wasn't buying it, but she wasn't going to argue with him. "You'll make it." There was confidence in his voice. A confidence she didn't feel, but she believed him anyway. Right now he was probably clearer headed than she was, so if she needed to believe anyone, she'd put all her trust in him, and accept that he was going to help her pull through.


End file.
